/lit/ - Literature

>>19256483
you should always read the most recent translation that has come out because that translator has the benefit of reading all the previous translations and can fix their mistakes

When Tolstoy was his late years, he refused to talk about his two most famous novels: The War and Peace, and Anna Karenina. He believed those were bad writings.

>>19256512
if only

>>19256483
Probably Mauds. I wouldn't even rate it higher than The Adventures of Philip or The Virginians. I guess that's subjective, it's certainly famous.

>>19256524

Yeah I've heard he went through his tradlarp phase. Ah well man we've all been there. Hadji Murat is unironically very very good though, I loved that one. Don't know when the death of Ivan Ilyich was written in his career but that was magnificent as well.

>>19256529

Would you really put Thackeray above Tolstoy? I've only ever looked into Vanity Fair and found it horrifically stilted and boring (not to discount what you're saying). Perhaps I should read the ones you've mentioned instead.

>>19256512

I know this technically SHOULD be true but sadly there are plenty of new translations that are quite shit. Often made with an agenda behind them or coloured by the temptation of the translator to 'improve' on Tolstoy himself rather than just improve upon his predecessor's assays in translation.

Read Edmonds. Her translation is the most enjoyable to read and that is the most important thing on a first read. Read different translations when you reread it.

>>19256524
He believed all sorts of other nonsense too

>>19256591

Didn't he go vegan? Or am I hallucinating/buying into vegan propaganda? I swear I've read actual quotes of his talking about how eating meat without it being necessary for your own survival is tantamount to murder, and how his health and 'soul' have improved when he stopped drinking milk and shit as well.

I really hope P&V arent bad. i already spent the money not realizing i got the one translation everyone here likes to shit on

>>19256569
>Would you really put Thackeray above Tolstoy?
I would put Dostoevsky and Nabokov ahead of Tolstoy, and possibly James Joyce. None of which I care for. But yes, I love Thackeray.

>those two
If you didn't like Vanity Fair you won't like any Thackeray, except possibly Barry Lyndon.

>his tradlarp phase
A bit of reduction, he's not a fedora-tier teenager with low self-esteem that posts on here.

>Ah well man we've all been there
>We've all been 70 your old acclaimed writers who have nervous breakdowns and develop theories about art for the remainder of our life.
Delusional

>Don't know when the death of Ivan Ilyich was written in his career but that was magnificent as well.
The only late work people question is Resurrection; and that's solely in regards to it's quality vs. Karenina and War and Peace. Tolstoy is never remotely close to a bad writer or not very good. Me disliking him, nor not considering him a master doesn't change that.

>>19256529

>Mauds

Is that the one that Oxford prints? Book depository says its translated by

>Louise and Aylmer Maude

>>19256734
Yeah

>>19256677

Interesting post.

>I would put Dostoevsky and Nabokov ahead of Tolstoy, and possibly James Joyce.

I like Nabokov very much but I don't know if I could justify putting him above Tolstoy. What makes you say that he ought to be considered so? Obviously, I've not read Tolstoy's 'masterpiece' so I can't really assess with much accuracy, but surely in terms of sheer scope and influence Tolstoy would have to come first. Dostoevsky I find a bit shambolic when compared with Tolstoy but again I have no Russian so perhaps the fault is with the translators. Joyce I used to like very much and probably his vision was much grander than that of Tolstoy, but I think his influence outside of the Anglosphere (and indeed outside of his own century) is decidedly limited, and am therefore inclined to consider him and aberration rather than a development in the history of literature.

>I love Thackeray

I've never seen a Thackeray enthusiast before. What about him is so appealing to you, in particular? Is there anything you would say sets him above other Victorian novelists?

>Delusional

Come on bro I'm obviously having a joke here.

>The only late work people question is Resurrection;

I've heard that's the one thats a stinker in particular.

> Tolstoy is never remotely close to a bad writer or not very good. Me disliking him, nor not considering him a master doesn't change that.

And this is fair. Out of curiosity, if you were to try and choose on 'four classic novels' of western literature, what would your guess be? For my part, I might suppose Don Quixote, The Sorrows of Young Werther, Anna Karenina, and In Search of Lost Time, for a first draft list.

>>19256744

cheers

>>19256780
I just like him more, haven't thought about it too much desu. Burgess and Nabokov's English work is solely referential to Joyce desu.

There's some odd nostalgia and longing in each passage, I refer to Adventures of Philip which is just some man reflecting on life and childhood and each turn-of-phrase, there's some line said in passing that makes you think on life. When he's describing Doctor Fell at first is very interesting. It's a great book.

kek
I mean it's still written by the man who wrote War and Peace and Karenina, so maybe there's some hidden depth.

>four classic novels
This is impossible to pick lol. My four favorites are not necessarily the four best, and I've never read Proust at length. Aside from Werther, the other 3 seem pretty standard, so I'd think it'd make sense. Maybe Moby Dick, Ulysses, Scarlet Letter, Gulliver's Travels, Portrait of a Lady, Tom Jones, Ivanhoe? There's a lot to choose.

Here's some of mine

>English
Confidence Man
House of Seven Gables
Under Western Eyes
The Adventures of Philip

>HM 4
World of William Clissold
Golden Bowl
A Man Could Not Stand Up
Robinson Crusoe


>German
Elective Affinities
Wilhelm Meister
Wilhelm Meister 2
Man Without Qualities

Have never read Thomas Mann or Schiller

>French
Duchess of Langeais
Madame Bovary
Castle to Castle
Seraphita

>Other
Don Quixote
Sigismunda and Persiles
Growth of the Soil
Doctor Glas

>Russian
Brothers Karamazov
Virgin Soil
Anna Karenina
Dead Souls

>>19256865

Ok interesting stuff on Thackeray. I'll have to give him a shake after I'm done with Tolstoy. Thanks man.

As to the Classic selections, Germany seems fairly standard issue, Russian I wouldn't know but seems to align with consensus, French I might have thrown in Proust definitely, and maybe Hugo and Dumas. I've not really gotten into Balzac but perhaps I should assay to those ends.

I am surprised at the English picks though! Why the confidence man over Moby-Dick, for a Melville entry? If I were to pick four just from English, probably I'd have go something like

Ivanhoe
Moby-Dick
Bleak House
Ulysses

To try and give representation to all the major regions, but now I think about it, its quite hard to measure and would disproportionately favour the US if anything (I admit though I'm not American myself).

>>19257189
>Why the confidence man over Moby-Dick, for a Melville entry
I'm one of the ones who like his post-Moby Dick and poetry career a lot more than Moby Dick. I'd put Pierre above it too.

The rest are just the most notable book of writers I like. Bleak House I need to read.

>>19256654
I have no problems with it, but I have nothing to compare it to. My main problem with it is the cover makes it look like I'm reading a book for lonely middle aged women.

>>19257343
If you watch the film adaptations you will see that lonely middle aged women often think they are the target audience of the novel. To them Anna is a hero just as Levin is a hero to the wayward NEET larpers on 4chan.

Is this worth reading if you've been spoiled on the ending?

>>19257385
Obviously yes. The entire point of a story is to explore why the climax happens.

>>19257385
Maybe read something else by Tolstoy and see if you like it. If you enjoy his writing you will still like AK. It's an 800 page novel not a marvel movie.

>>19256483
maude
he worked with them directly

>>19257343
lel ive seen that one at thrift shops before. genuinely terrible. i got this penguin edition only to find it was p&v after

>>19256512
our language has deteriorated so much in the past 100 years that this isn't the case at all

>>19256524
I had no idea Tolstoy was so based.

>>19257250

Fair enough man. I've been enjoying the Oxford edition of his Piazza Tales (it doesn't call them that but whatever) and it's such kino man. Loved Bartleby especially. I'll have to give the confidence man a shake as well, I'm sure its good, though I've heard some people talk shit on it for nebulous reasons. I'd be interested to get into his poetry too; is the penguin edition much good, or is there a better one? Must feel great to come from a country with an actual body of literature. Fucking hate being Australian man.

>The rest are just the most notable book of writers I like

Fair

>>19256654
They do weird stuff, making the text sound unnatural where it's supposed to be natural, but they also preserve the originally "awkward" parts that other translators tend to smooth out. It's not perfect, but anyway it's semantically largely correct, and that's the most important part, since Tolstoy is no poet.

>>19257385
There's three endings in there, really. I got spoiled too with regards to Anna's death (do you really think that a 19th century realist novel would end with a "happy ever after"?) and it still ended up being among my three favourite novels of all time (and the two other ones were also spoiled to me). It's not a story of mystery and suspense, after all.

>>19256512
>that translator has the benefit of reading all the previous translations and can fix their mistakes
You overestimate the capabilities of the vast majority of translators.

>>19257721
I just read The Confidence Man last week and it was fucking incredible. I think if I read it a couple more times I'll probably have it equal to or even above Moby Dick which for now is my favourite book of them all

>>19256483
Rosamund Bartlett

>>19258077

For real? Damn, I'll order it when my paycheck comes in

>>19257721
My favorite is The Bell Tower, but Bartelby is amazing, as are all of theme. He structures it in a way where the stories all fit together but it’s not immediately clear how.

>piazza introduction
>bartelby, Benito parables
>lightning rod man interlude
>encantadas microcosm of what I described, leading to the Oberlus Hunilla dichotomy
>bell tower conclusion

Lol most American literature I don’t even like. Sadly I’ve never read any Aussies. Any recs?

>>19258077
Have you done Pierre?

>>19257385
Yes, the most interesting parts aren't even directly on Anna affair.

>>19257343
Who cares? People see your bookshelf?
Also, Tolstoy is very harsh on Anna. Definetely this book is not a celebration of 'vivre sa vie' ala Madame Bovary.

>>19256524
He also believed Shakespeare was a posion to the spirit or something.

>>19256734
no, but Everyman's published Maude

>>19256626
He was a vegetarian, not a vegan. Also, he advocated teetotalism and chastity, even after marriage. He was pretty healthy though, he lived to 82, which was quite long for the time, and could lift 82 kg with one hand.
>>19259324
Yeah, from his essay on Shakespeare:
>From his first words exaggeration is seen: exaggeration of events, exaggeration of feelings, and exaggeration of expression. It is at once evident that he does not believe in what he is saying, that he has no need to say it, that he is inventing the occurrences he describes, is indifferent to his characters and has devised them merely for the stage, and therefore makes them do and say what may strike his public; and so we do not believe either in the events or in the actions, or the sufferings of his characters.

>>19260804
>He was pretty healthy
>and could lift 82 kg with one hand
Levin really was his self-insert.

>>19256483
>Arthur Schopenhauer cited Don Quixote as one of the four greatest novels ever written, along with Tristram Shandy, La Nouvelle Héloïse and Wilhelm Meister.

Since Schopenhauer died a lot has changed in the novel world, so what are the four best novels now?

>>19260843
Hmm, four greats? Conventionally speaking, I'd say

War and Peace
Ulysees
Don Quixote
Crime and Punishment

But to that's all arbitrary really

>>19259036

Okay mate, I'll have a read of the Bell Tower next. Melville truly is the supreme prosaic kino in the English language, that I've read so far. I would be hard pressed to think of anyone better in terms of sheer composition.

>Sadly I’ve never read any Aussies. Any recs?

Well, Voss by Patrick White isn't bad, but it's overrated on here by Australians for sure. Interesting idea and story but heavy handed on the symbolism (which itself feels sort of disingenuous, as I don't think he was a believer himself). Of Coetzee's stuff the only one I'd recommend is Foe, which is genuinely quite clever ad enjoyable, though maybe get familiar with Robinson Crusoe before you read.

Full disclosure though, neither of these guys are actually Australian. Sure, they lived/live here, but the first was an Englishman and the second an Afrikaaner. Mansfield (a Kiwi) has some good stories but is decidedly un-antipodal in character (she moved to England and tried to larp like one of them her entire life basically). There has been essentially nothing good that has been written by a genuinely creole Australian, sadly. There's the poetry of Paterson, and the works of Lawson, (the first has his face on our ten dollar bill), but I would really struggle to recommend anything of Lawson'd in good faith, and whilst Paterson has some rather celebrated poems (Waltzing Matilda and the Man From Snowy River, for example), most of his stuff are like sea-chanty/drinking song level stuff.

I think the main problem we have here is that everyone has tried to larp either as yankee or a limey, and fall into the trap of imposing foreign psychologies onto our own country. Scarcely will an authentically Australian theme be taken, and now with the publishing industry making work impossible unless one ticks the boxes of sex, race, gayness, indigeneity, body-shape etc., its even worse. The publishing industry here is just talentless retards promoting other talentless retards. Shitty education in the humanities doesn't help either.

If you don't mind more 'bohemian' stuff, maybe read Monkey Grip or the Children's Bach, though I despise them and their author myself.

>>19261030
I can completely understand War and Peace topping off Julie; or, The New Heloise, and even Ulysses replacing Tristram Shandy as 'the' experimental novel, but do you really think Crime and Punishment is superior to Wilhelm Meister?

>>19261146
Don Quixote already was the experimental novel of the original list.

>>19261166
So what does that make Tristram Shandy?

>>19261171
The new experimental? Idk.

>>19257430
what's wrong with P&V? I have this version and found it incredibly easy to read

>>19260820
>Levin really was his self-insert.
I thought that while reading Anna Karenina too. Then one day last year I realized his real name is LEV TOLSTOY

>>19261213
Levin is all of us. easily one of the most based characters in literature

>>19259312
>a celebration of 'vivre sa vie' ala Madame Bovary
what

>>19256483
I read the Maude translation. I'd stick with that one, Tolstoy ok'd it himself. Otherwise if you're gonna be autistic just learn Russian and read the original.

>>19259312
>Who cares? People see your bookshelf?

I read on my breaks at work

>>19261488
Yeah sorry, people are gonna think you read chick lit anyway.

>>19261241
Not him, but I think he means Madame Bovary is a celebration or exultation of human freedom. Though Flaubert would probably disagree. He did, after all, call Bovary a whore on his death bed.

>>19259312
>a celebration of 'vivre sa vie' ala Madame Bovary.
hot damn

>>19257991
It literally does end with a happy ever after

>>19261991
Based, if true.

>>19262266
No, it literally ends with a character going to waste his life on a fake cause. Only one of the three endings is happy.

I am afraid I will always prefer Constance Garnet translation, I know that makes me old fashioned, but so be it.

>>19262384
Garnett for Dosto and Turgenev
Maudes for Tolstoy

>>19261202
It feels a little too jolting at times, it's not awful or unreadable but if I got the itch to reread Anna Karenina I'd probably read Rosamund Bartlett's translation which felt buttery smooth by comparison.

>>19262390
>Garnett for Dosto
I'm sorry but her Crime and Punishment isn't that great. Her Anna Karenina is better but still not the best compared to newer ones.

>>19262468
The newer ones are terrible, P and V is horrific.

>>19262502
>newer ones
>P and V
That one is over twenty years old now, the Maude's and the one by Rosemary Edmonds are both older but still better than P&V.

>>19256483
I read Anna in both P&V and Maude and preferred P&V, idk both are good but I just liked the style of P&V a little better. Also I'm literally never reading Garnett again, she straight up ruined Dostoevsky for me.

>>19256734
>Is that the one that Oxford prints?
It's this one:
https://www.bookfinder.com/search/?isbn=9780199536061&st=xl&ac=qr

>>19261991
>He did, after all, call Bovary a whore on his death bed.
Sauce?

>>19261192
Bruh, I understand Don Quixote was experimental for the time but Tristram Shandy as well as Ulysses are forever experimental. That's why I don't think Don Quixote can be called an experimental novel.